Who doesn’t love a good snack here and there? Whether you need a little pick me up during the day or just want a little something to nibble on as you sit down to relax for the night, snacking is a joy of life and can ultimately be a valuable part of a healthy lifestyle if done correctly.
So, is snacking bad for psoriasis? The effect that your snacking habits will have on your psoriasis, eczema, or dermatitis is determined by 1. What foods you are snacking on 2. When you are snacking and 3. How often you are snacking. By choosing to snack on whole foods and learning to understand when and how often you should be eating, you are ensuring that your snacks are benefiting rather than hurting your health.
Skin-healthy snacks
So first off, what is a healthy snack exactly? My definition of a healthy snack would be a whole food that contains the right macro and micronutrients to compliment the rest of your diet. Stay away from the packaged energy and protein bars. I know that some of them are fairly healthy and I myself will occasionally grab a Kind bar or something if I’m on the go. With that said, you’re much better off eating snacks that you’ve prepared for yourself. Simplicity is key in healing and maintaining good gut health. You want to get food that has been as minimally processed as possible. Below I have listed some good snack options.
- Smoothie with fruits and veggies (maybe seeds or nuts)
- Fresh vegetable juice
- Fruit
- Nuts and berries
- Homemade hummus with veggies
- Avocado toast (sprouted whole grain bread)
- Oats
- Celery sticks and nut butter
- Organic hard boiled eggs
- Coconut manna
Snacks you should avoid
As I mentioned in the healthy snacks section, you ideally want to get your food straight from the source. While just about everyone knows that things like potato chips and candy aren’t nutritious food options, there are many snack foods that are perceived as being healthy but in reality are not. If you are serious about healing your gut and want to eat the healthiest diet possible for you, then I would suggest you stay away from anything packaged and anything that can’t be considered a whole food. Below I’ve listed some typical light snacks that may be viewed as healthy by some people but should probably be avoided by anyone who wants to heal their gut.
- flavored yogurt
- Sugary sports drinks
- Pretzels
- Granola
- Popcorn
- Cookies or crackers
- Chips
- white bread
- Protein bars
- Store bought dips
Timely snacking
Just as the type of food you’re snacking on matters, when you are snacking is also an important factor to consider. The key here is to keep your meals and your snacks as far away from each other as possible. You want to eat your snacks at the right time of day so that they not only restore your energy but also don’t interfere with the digestion of your other meals.
Look at it this way. Each meal that you eat is going to take a few hours to digest (give or take). If you eat a big dinner at 7 pm and then eat a snack at 8 pm that requires different enzymes to digest, your body then has to address your snack which takes attention away from your meal and ultimately leads to poor digestion of both the meal and the snack.
The best time to have a snack is at least 2-3 hours before or after a meal. Use your snacks as an opportunity to get some extra nutrients into your body rather than just something you do when you’re bored. The truth is, snacking is not essential and some may even argue that you’re better off without it entirely. If you are going to snack, just make sure to follow the advice provided in this blog post and you should have nothing to worry about in terms of your snacks negatively affecting your health.
How to avoid unhealthy snacking habits?
The major key to avoiding unhealthy snacking is to make sure that you are eating meals that satisfy your hunger and keep you satiated for longer. I’ve heard the phrase, “Fill up on the steaks so you don’t eat the cakes.” Not that you have to be eating steaks, but I like the phrase. Don’t be afraid to fill yourself up during your meals. Just make sure that the meals you’re eating are nutritious and easy on digestion.
Another great tip for avoiding unnecessary and unhealthy snacking habits is to stop buying snacks that you know you probably shouldn’t be eating. Let’s say you ate dinner around 6 pm and start to feel the need for something small around 830 or so. If you look in your pantry and it’s filled with bags of chips and processed protein bars, odds are you are going to cave into that pressure and eat one of those options. So my advice would be to keep your fridge or pantry stocked with simple whole foods that will make for a nutritious snack.
How many times should you eat a day?
This takes us into the question of how many times you should eat in a day. If you research and search the web for long enough, you are likely to find a few different answers to this question. The two most popular opinions are that you should either eat 2-3 or 5-6 times a day. There are even some people out there who swear by the 1 meal per day method. Although I try to avoid blanket statements or claiming that there is only one way to do things, I do have a strong opinion concerning this subject.
I personally have extensively experimented with all of these 3 eating schedules. In my experience, I have found that eating 2-3 meals a day is what works best for me. Although I will occasionally eat 4 times in a day, I typically stick to just 3. I aim to fit a lot of nutrition and calories into these meals and make sure that they are satisfying enough in order to avoid having to eat more often than I feel I should.
While my first and third meals of the day are typically my larger more conventional “meals”, my second meal is typically what I call my “snack”. With that said, this is usually a pretty high calorie snack ranging anywhere from 600-900 calories. This usually comes in the form of a smoothie or oats with fruit, nuts, and seeds.
The reason why I believe eating 2-3 times a day is the healthiest option is simple. I don’t believe that human beings are made to constantly be consuming food. If you take a look at our ancestry, having food available to us all times is still a fairly new idea. If you go back to the times of hunters and gatherers, you will see that these humans certainly were not eating 5-6 times a day. They would typically eat 1-2 times per day and sometimes not at all. I have found that staying fairly close to these eating habits is what works best for me and my digestion.
I also mentioned earlier how each meal you consume takes around a few hours to digest and that eating meals or snacks too close together can cause a metaphorical traffic jam within your gut which can lead to digestive issues. This is another reason why I don’t believe that you should be eating 5-6 times or more throughout the day. By eating 2-3 fulfilling meals and spacing them far apart from each other, you are ensuring that each meal is being digested fully and independently from the next.
My take
Snacking is a tricky subject when it comes to digestion. Although I do believe that snacking the right way can be a healthy habit to develop, you really should take the points I’ve made in this article into consideration. I always say that the power behind the complex subject of nutrition can be unlocked following simple principles. When it comes to snacking, Eat whole foods and keep your snacks as far away from your meals as possible.
